Abstract

While Information Technology (IT: data processing, telecommunications) extends itself among the various fields of society, over the last few years more and more people everywhere have begun to speak of a "society of information". The advent of important technical and social novelties is announced but there is hardly a systematical and critical examination of this concept. This paper has two main parts. In the first, a description and a critical analysis are made of the principal aspects of the society of the information (technological determinism and theories on remodelling, post-fordism, and critical aspects). The second part examines the influence that informatioon technologies have on organisations, with special attention to the structure of the organisations, in the organisation of work and in the process of implementation of the technology.